I always use the remote option if it's offered knobs and buttons can and will fail eventually, it also has settings for restart and sleep.

You can also shutdown the device from the zen stream page on the browser or the mobile app I would recommend doing that because physical pressing the button will degrade it's life span

I had real and clear differences from the laptop (as a source) to the zen dac also from the micro idsd to the zen dac signature I also don't believe that ''digital is digital no matter what'' implementation must play a big role even among digital sources. Cheers

I get how good hardware like good usb and coaxial outputs and more importantly a good power supply can benefit sound quality but how can a streamer alter sound with software optimizations? It doesn't do any conversions just transport the digital file to the dac others say that when in digital...

I don't see how a firmware update could made a difference in sound quality when we are talking about a streamer... assuming volume normalization is off and you use the same settings and output as before... though zen stream made a big difference in sound quality when compared to the usb output...

2.32.9 But as said above it is just the last update not the update we are waiting for the tidal connect.

I don't think it affects the sound quality but it is wise to always update your hardware for security reasons especially zen stream that has the ability to connect to the internet and communicating with your devices across your wifi network.

Today zen stream got a new update....but still tidal connect forces mqa versions and no hi res flac. Did I do something wrong? Do I need to change any settings?

I remember that Tidal start offering Tidal Max instead of MQA since August of 2023.... we are almost a year after that and we still can't use the full potential of the streamer because of an update. I think that roon users can enjoy the hi res tidal max tier but for the price of roon in a year...

the only difference that it makes is that it keeps scanning the usb disk and putting some effort on the zen stream to do it i don't think it can make an audible difference....after all zenstream is designed to read files from an external usb drive....

the idea is to get an amp that will drive anything and last for long time...I am thinking about combining it with the denafrips ares II and call it endgame setup for headphones....then i will only try new headphones....

Thanks a lot for your input....that's great news! I always wanted to try a Violectric amp and the v2222 seems the best deal....not to mention it will play very well with hd650 on balanced connection.....

Nice Setup! I am thinking to buy Violectric V222 for my ndh30...would you say they have good synergy?

I know Roon got the update.... The problem is with Tidal Connect.....I would use roon but it is too pricey combined with tidal which is like 15 euros/month in my country Also one of the main reasons I chose zen stream was tidal connect.... I hope we will get the update soon maybe I will...

Are there any updates on zen stream playing along with tidals new hi res files? its been almost 7 months now and we are still waiting for zen stream to get an update that will allow us to play tidals hi ress files.... I certainly don't have any use for mqa and the only reason I keep paying...